All 13 Uses
compel
in
Jude the Obscure
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- After a further consideration of a few days he did act, and on the day of the piano's departure, which happened to be his next birthday, clandestinely placed the letter inside the packing-case, directed to his much-admired friend, being afraid to reveal the operation to his aunt Drusilla, lest she should discover his motive, and compel him to abandon his scheme.†
Part 1compel = force; or (more rarely) convince
- As to the point in question he was compelled to accept her word; in the circumstances he could not have acted otherwise while ordinary notions prevailed.†
Part 1 *compelled = forced; or (more rarely) convinced
- II Necessary meditations on the actual, including the mean bread-and-cheese question, dissipated the phantasmal for a while, and compelled Jude to smother high thinkings under immediate needs.†
Part 2
- The barmaid concocted the mixture with the bearing of a person compelled to live amongst animals of an inferior species, and the glass was handed across to Jude, who, having drunk the contents, stood up and began rhetorically, without hesitation: "Credo in unum Deum, Patrem omnipotentem, Factorem coeli et terrae, visibilium omnium et invisibilium.†
Part 2
- All the furniture being fixed, the books shelved, and the nails driven, he had begun to sit in his parlour during the dark winter nights and re-attempt some of his old studies—one branch of which had included Roman-Britannic antiquities—an unremunerative labour for a national school-master but a subject, that, after his abandonment of the university scheme, had interested him as being a comparatively unworked mine; practicable to those who, like himself, had lived in lonely spots where these remains were abundant, and were seen to compel inferences in startling contrast to accepted views on the civilization of that time.†
Part 3compel = force; or (more rarely) convince
- To be sure, there seemed to exist these other and sufficient reasons, practical and social, for her decision; but Sue was not a very practical or calculating person; and he was compelled to think that a pique at having his secret sprung upon her had moved her to give way to Phillotson's probable representations, that the best course to prove how unfounded were the suspicions of the school authorities would be to marry him off-hand, as in fulfilment of an ordinary engagement.†
Part 3compelled = forced; or (more rarely) convinced
- It is also said that after the Middle Ages the inhabitants were too poor to pay their priests, and hence were compelled to pull down their churches, and refrain altogether from the public worship of God; a necessity which they bemoaned over their cups in the settles of their inns on Sunday afternoons.†
Part 4
- I would not ask if I were not almost compelled by what I can't bear!†
Part 4
- This, and the necessity of ready money, compelled him to decide on an auction, much as he would have preferred to keep the venerable goods.†
Part 5
- It chanced to be a wet day; moreover Sue was unwell, and not wishing to desert her poor Jude in such gloomy circumstances, for he was compelled to stay awhile, she acted on the suggestion of the auctioneer's man, and ensconced herself in an upper room, which could be emptied of its effects, and so kept closed to the bidders.†
Part 5
- He stated that, it having come to his knowledge that her views had considerably changed, he felt compelled to say that his own, too, were largely modified by events subsequent to their parting.†
Part 6
- The closing hour came, and they were compelled to turn out; whereupon Arabella put her arm round his waist, and guided his unsteady footsteps.†
Part 6
- The water ran out of him as he went, and he was compelled to lean against the wall to support himself while coughing.†
Part 6
Definitions:
-
(1)
(compel) to force someone to do something
or more rarely:
to convince someone to do somethingMost typically, compel describes an external influence forcing someone to do something, but it can also describe being driven by an internal desire. - (2) (meaning too rare to warrant focus)